


Close Your Eyes

by CopperBeech



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Blow Jobs, Coming Untouched, Don't copy to another site, Essentially The Whole Shooting Match, Established Relationship, Fluff and Smut, Frottage, Gentle Dom Aziraphale (Good Omens), Hand Jobs, I will probably fry in hell for this, Light Bondage, M/M, Massage, Obedience, Orgasm Delay, Porn with Feelings, Sex Toys Under Clothing, Shameless Smut, Sleepy Cuddles, South Downs Cottage (Good Omens), Sub Crowley (Good Omens), Trust Kink, erotic spanking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-16
Updated: 2019-11-16
Packaged: 2021-01-31 12:04:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21445936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CopperBeech/pseuds/CopperBeech
Summary: Some bedroom banter about penances puts a not-quite-nice idea into Aziraphale’s head, but it turns into a sweet exploration of how liberating it is for Crowley to simply surrender to his angel, and Aziraphale feeling his way  into the responsibility that comes with being even a soft Dom.Or, a four part broadside of unapologetic filth, with a fluffy little cherry on top.He sidles around the last stack of books and sets down the bottle, and is about to swivel onto the couch when Aziraphale’s knee comes up, catching him just hard enough on the leg to throw him off balance, and he stumbles sideways. A strong hand catches him before he can hurt himself, and another shifts to press him facedown over the angel’s knees. He’s a little gobsmacked by how fast it’s happened.The hand is quite unyielding. Aziraphale’s sitting forward so that Crowley’s just off the edge of the couch, knees on the floor. He braces his forearms on a small pile of 1860’s travel journals and experimentally pushes upward. He’s not going anywhere.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 99
Kudos: 476
Collections: Top Aziraphale Recs





	Close Your Eyes

**Author's Note:**

> Pinky swear, all elements of this fic have been field tested to at least some degree. For Art.
> 
> Except for the first, the section headers are from Revelations, Psalms and Proverbs.

Part One, _Canonical Hours_

It’s still a little hard for Crowley to believe, when he wakes like this: his arm over the sleeping angel, fingers tipping in the curled meadow of hair that spreads across his chest, pressed against his back, a little heavy with the want that rises in sleep. The tranquility is precious enough that he chooses not to move, content for awhile to remain hungry at this banquet. If we were able to see them – which of course we wouldn’t be, unless we were God, who secretly thinks they’re adorable – we might miss the little signatures of desire: the fingertip trailing over a soft pink nipple, whispered kisses on the ends of curling blond hair. But finally there’s the sleepy reach of hand to cover hand, bringing the fingertips to quirked lips.

“Good morning, angel. Would you like me to wake you up?”

It’s heady, this idea of Aziraphale _waking,_ because, of course, it means Aziraphale _sleeping._ The demon had learned all the angel’s pleasures, and taught him this one.

Others seem to come naturally to them both. Like this bolder finger-stroke around the silky nipple, pinching it into a pucker.

“That feels nice.”

“ ‘M not nice.”

“Do you know what you’re doing to me?”

“I couldn’t imagine. Tell me.”

“If you continue, I shall be singing Matins.”

“Continue this?”

Random patterns on the stretched skin of a full cock. He knows the angel likes that kind of touch, as he likes to give it; if he didn’t, the wriggle against him would have told him. He shifts enough to settle himself against the perfectly delectable, plump, fleshy cleft.

“Donatello should have painted your arse.”

“How do you know he didn’t? Mmmhm – like that.”

“Because since they invented tailoring, you’ve never been seen in public wearing fewer than forty-six layers.”

“You like it. Taking them off.”

“I like unwrapping packages. Like this one.” A squeeze.

“How long are you going to tease me?"

“Oh, till Prime at least.” He ghosts his tongue up the back of the angel’s neck in a chain of small flicks, because he loves to feel the pale hair on those Heavenly arms stand on end. It also elicits beautiful noises.

“Which liturgy is that?”

“It’s the Hymn To The Demon Who Is Soon To Have His Smart Mouth Full. If you would be so kind.”

“Patience.”

It’s truly criminal to do this any faster than he can manage. Even if it brings on a deep ache between his own legs. He’s moving against that lush crevasse, but not any more quickly than he can help. There’s a little gout of slickness under his thumb now, and it’s not just a helpful miracle. “What’s this here? A little angel juice.”

“Quite a bit more where that came from. You’ll see.”

“It seems a waste to just _look.”_ Though he admits he’s found it a nice sight in the past, especially spilling over his knuckles. “Stop me when you’re close.”

“Bastard.”

He still shivers when Aziraphale talks like this. He’d enjoy toying with the angel in any case, thwarting is a game they’ve played for centuries, but he’s glad for the way it disguises how much he needs what they have together in this bed, what was turned away so many times before he could even offer it. It feels a little dangerous to let that show.

“Told you, ‘m not nice.”

By now he knows the low sound Aziraphale makes in his throat when he’s ready to come. Once they’d started feasting on each other they couldn’t stop, sixty centuries of banked flame, and he’s learned the noises, the wordless pressures that mean _now _or _slow _or _I need you._ He slides his fingers down to the root in its curly thatch and clamps it tight.

“Not yet.”

“The penance for this is going to be dire.”

“I can’t wait.”

“You’re making _me_ wait.”

Stroking up to the tip to pinch it with the flat of his fingertips. “I read this will throttle it right back.”

“Where do you find these books?”

“I know a bookseller.” The wetness is now slicked over his fingers and the angel’s belly; Aziraphale, not to put too fine a point on it, _leaks _when he’s desperate, quite a bit. It’s delicious. He slips his hand off to rub some of it over himself, snuggling back against warm angel bum.

“Think of this as starters. We’ll progress to the dining.”

“If you don’t put your hand back we’ll progress to me finishing the job for you.”

“We’ve plenty of experience handling each other’s assignments.”

He knows the angel’s backside is sensitive and works himself against it. Turns his fist into something almost too tight for the angel to thrust into.

“Please, a little, a little – “

“Nothing little happening here – -”

“ –– _fuck!”_

He’s always undone by hearing that word from Aziraphale’s lips.

“Well, we _are_ a sticky mess.”

It doesn’t seem to bother the angel, who takes advantage of Crowley’s loosened limbs to turn and suck his tongue down into a kiss. Aziraphale’s still fadingly hard, still conferring intermittent blessings.

“I impose a Perfect Act Of Contrition. Other atonement to be decided.”

“You wait until Vespers.”

“An all night vigil?”

“For a start.”

* * *

Part Two, _Cleanse Away Evil_

It is a start. He has apparently set something off in the angel’s mind.

They’re in Aziraphale’s rooms above the shop, which are also rat-packed with books, and as antique-looking as everything else about the place – a crocheted antimacassar on the back of the couch (he probably crocheted it himself), on which are also piled stacks of bibliophile catalogues. It’s a warren, but he had the perfect wine for tonight up here, and he keeps the rooms warm for his demon.

Things are stacked on the floor, boxes from estate sales, a full-set Oxford English Dictionary that’s missing just one volume which has _got _to be in here somewhere, a changing maze of treasures that’s constantly being organized and added to and gone-over in a way that holds it back from the threshold of _hoarding._ Crowley threads his way through the obstacle course, carrying the wine and a corkscrew; Aziraphale’s already got the glasses on the side table. The last bit before the couch is obstructed enough that he’d do better in his serpent form.

He sidles around the last stack of books and sets down the bottle, and is about to swivel onto the couch when Aziraphale’s knee comes up, catching him just hard enough on the leg to throw him off balance, and he stumbles sideways. A strong hand catches him before he can hurt himself, and another shifts to press him facedown over the angel’s knees. He’s a little gobsmacked by how fast it’s happened.

The hand is quite unyielding. Aziraphale’s sitting forward so that Crowley’s just off the edge of the couch, knees on the floor. He braces his forearms on a small pile of 1860’s travel journals and experimentally pushes upward. He’s not going anywhere.

“Uh – angel – ?”

Aziraphale’s voice is warm, gentle, despite the immovable force of his hand. “Well, my dear, I did say I would decide on other atonement. You can be quite trying sometimes, you know.”

There are actually yellow flowers in the carpet pattern as well as blue. He hasn’t noticed that before.

“And I was able to recall a good number of times you’ve teased me awfully, just like the other morning… I think I have an accurate count.”

He feels the little _frisson_ that comes when a miracle happens close by and realizes the waistband of his jeans is open.

“I do think there should be some sort of penance for the repeated infraction.”

He doesn’t know why his heart gives a little lurch at this. So does his cock. It’s got more room to move than it did a few minutes ago, because Aziraphale’s coaxed the jeans down over his thighs now, one-handed, and is stroking his bottom.

“Are you prepared to make contrition, and receive absolution?”

“Ah… yeah.” He likes the pressure between his shoulderblades, and how exposed he feels. He’s not sure why, but he does.

“Let’s see, something with a bit of heft to it. Yes, the Spring issue.”

The hand leaves him for a moment, and then Aziraphale smacks a rolled-up copy of the British Library Catalogue down on his arse, hard enough to make him jump.

It’s a thick catalogue, and it stings. “One.” Aziraphale brings it down right at the curve of the buttock, where it stops being a nice thing you can mention in polite society as a _hip,_ and becomes a tender rounding of flesh that sends telegrams everywhere in the nervous system at the lightest touch.

Aziraphale’s having no mercy on it. A dozen more smacks, counted off, alternating sides; he’s wriggling to get away from it but at the same time anticipating each blow. He’s hard now, which is a little unexpected.

The flurry pauses. A finger strokes him gently in little circles.

“You’ve got such transparent skin, Crowley. You’re a beautiful shade of pink here.”

Lips replace the finger, tongue just flicking. Aziraphale has apparently heard of the practice of _kissing it better._

The catalogue comes down again. It springs away as soon as it strikes, leaving little incandescent scatterbursts of sensation in its wake, like a fireworks display.

“We’re not done quite yet. I’m keeping count.”

His bum burns and it’s unspeakably good and it feels as if he’s going to split if he gets any harder. The angel’s nails rake gently over his stinging backside. The catalogue takes a detour down his thighs, coming back to land exactly at the cleft of his spare arse cheeks, making him jump again.

“Blows cleanse away evil,” murmurs Aziraphale, who doesn’t seem to find him at all evil, and he’s pretty sure that’s King James, but Bible scholarship can’t be your strong suit when the damn things give you blisters.

The soothing hand returns, the feathery kissing. He’s frankly rocking his hips now, and the angel has to be aware of the erection separated from his thigh only by a layer of twill. He’s going to leak all over Aziraphale’s trousers, and he can’t make himself care. Even stranger, _Aziraphale _doesn’t appear to care either.

“Are you going to be good now?”

He’s trying to get a purchase, to get friction. “If – this – is – what – I – get – for being – _bad_ I am going to be _absolutely horrid_.”

“Are you, darling?”

The last blow is explosive, and he’s straining for it, wanting so badly and not able to quite get there. Aziraphale lifts him up gently, with that same effortless, offhand strength.

_“Please.”_

“You like making _me_ say that.”

“I’m bloody begging you.”

“Hm. Well, you know, it’s made me – ah – rather eager, too. Though after that I would hate to, well, _belabor_ you more, or put any weight on that sweet _croupe_… perhaps you could do the honours tonight?”

He’s got the angel out of the forty-six layers in a race with his own cock, at least enough of them to get where he needs to go, and he’s going to have rug burns, but there’s a lot of soft angel under him, and those solid thighs clamped around his flanks, and the manicured nails drawing circles on arse cheeks that feel as if they’re radiating heat. When he comes it pushes them both a couple of inches across the carpet. At least two stacks of books have toppled like houses of cards. He collapses, dimly aware that the angel must have been on a hair-trigger too because somewhere in there Aziraphale finished ahead of him.

“All right, darling?”

“You are,” he says, “just enough of a bastard.”

“Swearing. Penance to be determined.”

He can only giggle weakly.

* * *

Part Three: _He Laid Hold Of That Serpent_

It still hurts a little the next morning, like a sunburn, though not in a bad way because every time his clothes rub against the buzzing skin his cock fills a little and it’s distracting but he’ll take it. The angel is prim, composed, says nothing about it, in fact he’s especially loving and breaks out an Armagnac that he’s been saving for something special, goes along with everything the demon likes. Crowley luxuriates in it, lets himself feel spoiled, and he still goes on being tenderly maddening in bed because that’s what he does, and Aziraphale lets him.

He doesn’t even complain when a weird exhilaration that’s got something to do with recollections of his bum sliding against the seat, the morning after that surprising evening, inspires Crowley to supernaturally reckless feats with the Bentley. It’s a few weeks later and they’re crisscrossing the South Downs, looking for exactly the right place, and it’s got to be one that’s a little distance away from neighbours, he’s beginning to see that.

The day’s grey, with a bit of a chilly edge, and after wandering through a few promising properties they try to whip a little heat into themselves by hiking across the gentle slopes. Aziraphale’s already embracing the role of country squire, with a carved ashplant and a ridiculous hat. He’s beatific, the food they find nearby even meets his standards, and the bed-and-breakfast where he insisted on reserving for the night, instead of going directly back to London, is cramped in the old English style and full of lovingly polished antique furniture and fussy wallpaper; Crowley can already see him furnishing their cottage in his head. He hums happily as he follows the demon up the stairs.

The room leaves the two of them just about enough space to turn around – this is apparently what was meant by “charming” – and the bed’s titchy, but romantic, an actual four-poster with carved finials. The angel probably remembers the exact historical period. Pleasantly tired from tramping over the Downs, and a little swimmy from the second bottle of Beaune, Crowley throws himself backward on the revoltingly flowered spread. Not just flowered, but quilted. _And_ ruffled. Aziraphale no doubt loves it. He stretches, finding his length reaches to all four corners of the bed. It’s going to be a snug night. No complaints about that. He’s always cold, and he likes wrapping himself around warm angel.

“C’mere,” he says, eyes closed, waving one hand as if ordering a refill.

“Just a moment. I’m enjoying the scenery.”

“Nothing like appreciating it up close. ‘S’why we got out of the car and went for a hike, ennit?”

“I’m just… considering something.”

Crowley feels the hairs on his arms lift, not unpleasantly.

“Let’s get you out of that.”

Well, this is very much the right direction. He lets Aziraphale undress him, at a stately and methodical pace; Crowley finds his hand batted away when he lifts it to help with the buttons. He’s not sure where precisely this is going (the general direction is clear), but he likes it. The angel runs a finger along his front, lifting the little trail of hair that runs from his navel downward. He’s still trying to figure out why Celestial bodies have navels, but he supposes it’s some sort of deep cover, like other bits and bobs they don’t need but are excruciatingly lovely to have.

“If I … try something, will you tell me if it’s all right?”

He opens his eyes at this. Aziraphale’s still in his shirt and knitted weskit, though he’s taken off the tie, and he looks especially pink after all that tramping on windy hillsides.

“I realize I was – a bit abrupt, last time I –”

“ ‘S’fine.” He’s got his clothes off and there’s an angel stroking him and how any part of that could ever not be _fine_ escapes him.

“I picked this room with it in mind. You remember all those photos we went through on Trip Advisor.”

“You did seem to be on a quest.”

“Close your eyes again.”

The angel’s rummaging in his absurdly overpacked valise, and then back beside the bed, running his fingers again – he likes mapping out Crowley’s lean shape, writing messages on him – this time from the little twisted flame of hair under his arm along the soft inner skin, pulling it back above his head as he reaches the wrist. A silky loop of fabric goes around the wrist, once, twice, snug but not galling. Oh. He senses the movements of Aziraphale tying what feels like a long silk scarf to the bedpost, he’s sure in a perfect reef knot. _Oh._

“All right there, my dear?”

His throat feels a little thick, but he manages a soft “Mm-hm.”

“I think it ought to be a Yes or No.”

“Yes.”

The angel picks his way around to the other side of the headboard and snugs Crowley’s remaining wrist against it. It’s almost instinctive to pull at the restraints, and they are indeed solidly done, he can’t move either arm and finds he needs to toss his head once from side to side, just to know he can move _something._ He’s acutely aware of the texture of the ridiculous ruffled spread under his arse; it’s soft and welcoming and the stupid quilting might not really be such a bad idea.

Sturdy fingers draw another roadway from the thin skin on the inside of his thigh – it makes him suck his breath in a little – down to his bony ankle. The scarf goes on lovingly, a little tighter than at the wrists. The angel has to pull his legs apart a bit further to reach the bedpost. He’s wide open.

Nails rake lightly down the inside of the other leg before he’s tied. He’s got a solid erection now, and normally he’d like nothing more than to improve it with his hand for the angel’s pleasure and edification, but that’s not happening.

“You look quite lovely that way.”

“Are you just going to look?”

“Considering the options.” Oh, Satan, Aziraphale _can_ be a bastard, and he knows it, but he’s such a _sweet_ bastard; even looking at the ceiling he can imagine the affectionate twinkle in those blue eyes, the tiny creases at their corners. “I’d been thinking about how the last time we did – something a little unusual, you seemed to enjoy having _me _in control. I hope I’m right about that.”

Crowley remembers coming like a contained grenade on the bookshop rug. ”I hope you could tell.” He’s still tugging at the bedposts a little bit, and it’s weirdly good to get this repeated proof that he can’t budge, that he’s not going anyplace until the angel lets him. Fingers are whispering over the tops of his feet, and when did anyone put that many nerve endings in _feet?_ He has to make an enquiry at the design department.

“I did chaff you about being wicked. But I have a bit of a theory, you know, that you can’t admit even to yourself how _good_ you are – “

“ ‘M’not.”

“There. You see? I wasn’t even done speaking.” Arch of the foot. The angel _knows _he’s ticklish, but somehow, immobilized like this, he finds the sensation turns into something deeper, a little fiery trail. “And you’ve been having to pretend for so long that you aren’t. Your job description said _evil_ and you turned it into a six-thousand-year dance of professional mischief. Like teasing angels in bed.” The rake of one nail up the other arch, and that makes his hips buck, but he can’t really even do that properly because of the way his legs are extended. There’s a little hollow flutter at the base of his belly. _Do with me what you will._ Some part of him has been wanting to say that since their eyes first met.

“Until just a few months ago, your life depended on convincing _everyone_, including yourself, that you were _not nice_. I saw the strain. All those years, you were like the third rail on these marvelous transport systems they have now. Dangerous to touch.” Not now, apparently, because Aziraphale seems to be writing an entire sonnet along the tender fold of skin under his toes.

“You’ve literally been through Hell, my dear. And I know I hurt you too. We were both so afraid, and I’m sorry for so many things… It would be a bit shocking if you hadn’t learned to always have your guard up. That bravado that makes you so delightful – there’s something a bit brittle about it, like a ganache.” He _would_ use dessert similes. “I’ve always seen the soft part underneath, but I’d like to see more, if you’ll let me… We’re safe now.” He’s not stopping; the fingers are running up Crowley’s heel cord, the design people should have mentioned this in the manual, it’s like a fire trail against a night sky when he can’t move and just has to take in the smallest sensation.

“Is this still all right?…I hope it is, because you look beautiful like that. But there should be something… what about ‘apple’?”

“Apple?” What?

“If you want me to stop anything at any point. Say ‘apple’. That way, in the meantime, you can say whatever else you want. I’ve been reading a bit about this sort of thing.”

“Of course you have, you utter bastard.”

“I ought to have thought of it before – last time, but the inspiration just ran away with me.”

His cock’s gone a little soft, because he’s been so focused on how opened up he is to all the other feelings that come from simply having the angel inscribe his love letter on a mere few inches of skin, but it comes back a little as lips press against the arch of his foot, tongue-tip tracing. It should tickle but it just makes him pull at the bonds as he tries to corral the sensation that runs up his leg, and now he’s getting seriously hard again.

“Are you going to faff about down there all night?”

“Taking my time. Oh, let me remind you, this is a small bungalow. Do remember to use your indoor voice. I’d like to get asked back if we come through here again.”

“Oh, you really _are_….”

But it’s good. The kisses and nail-rakes that work their way slowly up to his knees go straight to his centre, and he still tugs at the bedpost, and has to stuff his face against the feather pillow when it does start to make him whine. Aziraphale is doing this the way he’d approach the chef’s plate at their favorite sushi restaurant, sample this and savor it entirely before confusing your palate with the next delicacy. There’s nothing he can do about it, so he lets himself submerge in it.

Demons don’t trust. It’s not in their DNA, convoluted by the Fall, but Crowley’s never been a very good demon, he has to admit it himself, and he finds he trusts his angel utterly and completely. He’ll untie him if Crowley shouts _apple_ and makes the guests on the other side of the hall wonder if he’s barking. He won’t do this again if Crowley asks him not to. Right now he needs it to go on.

Aziraphale’s worked his way up to his thighs, drawing arabesques with his fingertips, leaning in with soft languid tongue-kisses and wicked little sucking ones that hurt wonderfully, he's going to have the story of this written all over him in the morning, and he just has to take it. His cock is inventing entirely new definitions of hardness, anticipating the touch that’s got to come soon, when Aziraphale shifts off the foot of the bed and comes around to the side to circle a thumb over his bound right wrist, just below the restraint. Crowley’s fingers curl. Aziraphale plants a long, languorous kiss in his palm. The demon’s breath shudders a little as he exhales. He is never going to let Aziraphale chide him about _making me wait_ again. He realizes the angel’s only starting on one arm and that he’s got another (basic facts like that are already starting to blur) and wonders if this pace could actually make him discorporate.

“Indoor voice, dear,” murmurs Aziraphale, lifting his head from the place where Crowley’s flank segues into his armpit, and he realizes he’s whining again, or making soft moaning sounds that occasionally peak to a mortifying little squeak. There’s not a lot he can do about it, except turn his face into the pillow again. The angel’s fingers travel over his ribs and find his nipple, which gets deliciously tortured for just a little too long, so that it’s starting to feel a little tender even before a tight pinch that makes him hiss with pain but makes his cock jump, too. He considers _apple_ and can’t bear the thought. The nipping kisses go up his throat. Hair stands on end in the general direction of everywhere. The fingertips brush up his other arm and oh, thank Satan, the lips are feathering their way down his chest, prickling up the little spray of hairs there at the midline, describing the curve of his ribs above his belly and then, oh Heaven and everything, _stopping_ to imprint a long, lazy kiss an inch short of the tip of his incandescent cock.

“Please,” he whimpers. “You’ve _got _to touch me.”

“I am touching you.”

“You know where I mean.”

“Not yet.” Oh, he’s being paid back for all the times he’s said that.

The fingertips dance over his sharp hipbones and draw little airbursts of sensation across the skin of his lower belly, stopping before there’s any chance of striking home. His back arches, making the loops of silk around his wrists and ankles tighten. He pulls against them, to have _something_ to strain against. The finger slinks right down to the root of his cock and stops, drags across his belly, stops, flicks up again to his navel (oh so _that’s_ why it’s there), circles it, he’s crying out softly while Aziraphale whispers _sssh, sssh, _and it’s like being hit in the centre of his body, there’s a hot gout and then another splashing on the cool skin of his belly and chest, and he stuffs his face against the pillows again, so he can let it out.

The angel waits while his breath slows, and then slides his weight off the bed to loosen the bonds at his feet, one hand, the other, using the last to clean him with little whisper strokes. The hands are less steady than they were a moment ago. He senses that the angel is a bit overwhelmed, too.

“Your trust is a gift,” Aziraphale says quietly. “I was so dreadful to you so many times, and left you uncertain for so long. When you were so dear to me.”

Crowley reaches up and then he’s sobbing against the angel’s broad chest, it’s grief for all those lost centuries but also relief and joy, and Aziraphale gathers him in his arms and holds him, taking nothing for himself.

Eventually they find their way into the sheets, and the angel pulls up the duvet accordioned at the foot of the bed, undressing only when they’re huddled in the warmth. Soft arms are around him all night while he sleeps, dreamlessly.

* * *

In the morning the room’s cold, but it’s toasty under the duvet, and he gives the angel a vigorous seeing-to before they go down to breakfast, feeling as if the world’s been washed clean and light is singing in his veins. He’s pretty sure that the sappy adoration with which he finds himself looking at Aziraphale telegraphs what they are to each other, and what they’ve been doing in that little room upstairs, to all the other guests in the cramped dining room, but he doesn’t care.

Yesterday’s overcast has blown off, it’s beautiful driving weather, and as he pilots the Bentley back through the green landscape towards London, he actually laughs, a sound the angel realizes he has never heard, not even during comedies at the Globe. Crowley feels no weight at all on his heart for the first time since he saw Aziraphale on the walls of Eden, smiled at him, saw him smile back and thought in the next heartbeat: _That’s an angel. I can never have him._

He’s never been happier to be wrong.

* * *

Part Four: _Fill Us With Your Love At Morning_

He decides the angel can do anything he likes. They hardly mention it, even when they talk about the trip and the places they looked at, but something’s happened, though for now they go on in bed as they have (it’s good, it’s all good) since they fell into it sometime in the aftershock of not going up in a pile of burning goo. He knows there’ll be more, and it’s a peculiar freedom, after six thousand years of indenture to Hell, to belong to just one being and want to allow him anything. He’s nonetheless completely unprepared for what happens next.

They’re lazing in bed in the morning again, not even touching more than comfortably, drinking the coffee Aziraphale has tried to make the way he likes it (he’s getting better at it) and the cocoa the angel always fixes for himself, trying to think of reasons to get up. They’ve spent most of the day before signing the papers on the cottage, picking things out for it, and it feels good to have a lie-in. Presently the angel breaks a companionate lull in the conversation by saying “Close your eyes, I have something for you.”

There’ve been a few moments like this: the key of the bookshop, some while back, and more lately a delicate bromeliad that Aziraphale had learned about at the botanical gardens and thought he ought to have; but this time the request feels different, more like that little bedroom on the Downs. He stretches luxuriously, head tilted away for good measure, one knee raised to prop his coffee cup. “Okay. Not looking.”

The angel eases the cup out of his hand.

He hears fumbling in the dresser drawer set aside for Aziraphale’s collar stays and garters and Heaven knows what else he needs to survive a night away from the bookshop. Aziraphale’s weight returns to the bed beside him, and those strong hands raise his other leg and prop it on a rounded shoulder. Well, this is a bit abrupt, but he’ll take it.

One hand parts him and slicks him, lovingly, taking some time about it, opening him by degrees and making him hitch irregular breaths. “C’n I open my eyes now?” he says.

“No.”

The fingers slide out, leaving an empty feeling, though one thumb still grips him, spreading him a little, and then they’re replaced by a broader pressure. It’s a moment of stretching pain that flashes past, and he whistles in a breath as he feels himself close over something metallically smooth, rounded, cool and thick, that narrows again so that he’s clamped down tight on it. A little flare palpable against his arse keeps it from slipping in any further. He’s never had anything inside of him there except Aziraphale, in various permutations, and this is different, heavy and unmoving, and his eyes open without waiting for permission. Wide.

“It’s remarkable what you can find in some of these little shops. How does that feel? All right?”

It feels like being violated and breached, and it’s astonishing, and he wonders why Hell ever imagined it had any sort of corner on the Lust market.

“Makes me want.” He sounds thick-tongued even to himself, and that’s something.

“Good. I’d like you to keep it there all day. Spiritual exercise. Can you do that?” He would have never thought that the angel had such an exquisitely dirty mind. But then, he’d slept through most of the end of the nineteenth century. “Oh, and you’re not to touch yourself. I’ll know.”

Aziraphale leans forward and kisses him chastely with closed lips.

He’s feeling a little flutter of muscle spasms, that presently quiets, to be replaced by a low-banked heat.

“Just go about your day, and I’ll see you when the shop closes at four.”

He repeats the soft, brotherly kiss when he leaves; Crowley’s up by that time, but he keeps having to lean on the furniture, what there is of it, and try to haul his attention back to whatever he’s doing, and he knows he had better get out of the flat as soon as he can, because otherwise he bloody well _will_ touch himself.

Walking through London, with his serpentine gait, is sweet torture. Two or three times he has to stop on the pavement and lean as inconspicuously as he can on a lamp standard, breathing slow and deep, because if he doesn’t, he’s pretty sure he’s going to come in his pants right in the middle of the zebra crossing. He thinks of the angel back at the shop, humming, making fresh cups of cocoa, adjusting his reading glasses. He’s afraid his expression gives away what he’s feeling and he’s never been more grateful for dark glasses. Sitting down is like a lower octave of being fucked.

It comes and goes in waves. Sometimes he’s able to concentrate, well enough to, for example, completely scramble a series of pizza orders (provoking _ira, _wrath, by turning takeaway orders into unwelcome surprises has always been a favorite minor temptation of his; now that he’s a demon emeritus it remains an occasional hobby, and it’s about all he’s up to at the moment). Sometimes he just wants to lean against a wall and moan. He’s promised to arrange some deliveries to the cottage, a scrolled end table and an antique sideboard that Aziraphale absolutely _had_ to have, and his conversation with the dealer is laced with mortifying Spoonerisms.

By four o’clock he’s unable to focus on anything except the mental effort required to not duck into the nearest phone box or entryway, yank down his jeans and give his cock the three or four pounding strokes that he’s sure would be all he’d need to come. He is fairly certain he’s tempted someone, at some point, to actually obey a crossing signal. He waits till a little past four, just to show he can, and slides into the front door just as the angel is coming to put up the Closed sign.

“My dear.” Aziraphale deposits another of those little pecking kisses on his cheek, fusses with the sign, straightens a shelf that doesn’t really need straightening, tidies away a little clutter on the desk. “A touch of that new Malbec I got in, perhaps? Let me pour it out to breathe, it seems the thing. It’s chilly. Was it a long day?”

He doesn’t wait for an answer, pops a cork and pours, then steps around the desk for a longer, deeper kiss. The demon’s still tongue-tied, except for this. Aziraphale runs a hand down his back, to the seat of his jeans.

“I knew you’d be good for me, dear.”

It’s warm in here, snake-warm, the way Aziraphale keeps it when he knows Crowley’s going to be spending time in the shop, and the _angel _ is warm, and having his front against him, after the last several hours, is headier than it usually is to be naked and inside him. They’re out of sight of the street here, but it would only take a step or two, and he wants to get upstairs to the cluttered flat to do whatever Aziraphale intends to do with him. But the angel leads him over to the flowery Queen Anne chair he sits in when his blessed music is playing, lifts off the dark glasses, sets them on the desk, and starts unbuttoning.

Aziraphale literally purrs when Crowley springs out of his jeans, and nudges him into the chair to work them off. Lowering his weight to the seat makes him grunt with the pressure.

Aziraphale’s on his knees now, setting the clothes aside, oddly pulling a handkerchief out of his inside pocket and laying it on the rug beside him as if he’s setting a table. “You deserve your reward for being so good,” he says. “Lift up a tidge, dear.”

A hand slips under him, gives that maddening fullness a little nudge that makes his cock jump. He’s suddenly surrounded by wetness and warmth, and the day’s pitch of sensation has built up a tolerance, he’s not about to explode on the spot the way he’d imagined he would, but all his nerves are still hanging out half an inch beyond his skin. Aziraphale loves doing this the way he loves anything else he can bring to his lips and savor on his tongue, and he goes about it the same way, gradual and thoughtful, with intermittent pauses just to appreciate a texture or an aroma. Crowley puts a hand in the curls at the back of his head, wanting him to speed up, but the angel firmly lifts it away with the hand he’s got free and pins it to the carved chair arm in a gentle but immovable grip.

The other hand’s busy with what’s been inside him all day. It doesn’t take more than a one-fingered tug or press to make him utter a primordial sound back in his throat.

It goes on like that, he’s not sure how long, the angel pausing to sweetly torment his backside and then going back to his epicurean pursuits. At some point Crowley notices that there’s no longer a hand pinning his wrist, but he’s taken direction, and besides, he’s getting a little past coordinated movement. Everything between his legs is drawn up tight.

He realizes that Aziraphale is taking care of himself with the hand that was holding him to the chair arm, but he doesn’t move, except for the primitive rhythm of his hips which he can’t control. The hand under him keeps nudging, shifting the pressure inside him while the angel does things with his mouth that feel so intense they spill over at times into pain, but he wants it, and just as his ragged breathing turns into a string of wordless eruptions, right at the cusp, Aziraphale gets a two-fingered purchase and eases the fullness out of him. He comes for what feels like a geological age, shudders going through him like the flutter of wind in leaves.

At some point, he manages to get his eyes open. The angel is still kneeling in front of him, smiling, well, angelically, tongue-tip just peeping out now and again to run over his lips, holding the blessed handkerchief over the open fly of his twill trousers, protect the Axminster at all costs. His fine cornsilk hair is barely even mussed. His reading glasses are still perched on his nose.. He’s got in his other hand what’s been inside Crowley all day, and it’s a very pretty little bauble really, not as large as it felt, glinting with a steel finish, the flare that kept it in place chased with a vaguely serpentine design. Trust Aziraphale to go high end.

He’s in a warm haze, like that time at Huysman’s place when he tried opium (it made him decide to go back to sleep for the remainder of the century), and feels as if he might be floating. It’s such a strong sensation that he experiments with rising from the chair, and flops back down.

“Christ.”

“Oh dear. Another penalty for blasphemy.”

“It’s just a habit you pick up from the way they talk. I can’t take something like that again any time soon, angel.”

“But you liked it, I hope?”

He can’t answer, just leans forward and clings, laughing softly.. Not so long ago he’d thought his heart was burnt black and his soul sealed, and a prim, filthy-minded angel has cracked him open, bit by bit. Aziraphale kisses his forehead.

“Do you suppose the wine’s breathed enough?”

* * *

Part Five: _Like The Precious Ointment_

The day they actually arrive for their first stay in the cottage is cold and blustery, but Aziraphale so wants to go for a tramp before dark that Crowley bundles up and insists on going with him. They’ve spent as long as anyone cares to spend on unpacking and deciding where things go, and there are still crates and boxes that are going to have to wait till tomorrow. Or next week. Seeing deliveries in his name and the angel’s to the same address makes Crowley giddier than he’d like to admit.

But it’s been damp and raw out, and the demon’s barely repressing a shiver and a frank chatter of teeth. Aziraphale kisses him, long enough to feel the shudder, and says _Go get in a hot shower and warm up. I have something for you._

He’s prepared to take direction here; cold is the one thing he can’t do well. Eden was perfect, the desert was baking, fucking England has captured his heart (for one thing, his angel’s in it and seems to have taken root here) but can’t win over his serpent constitution. The water pressure in this part of the island is mostly for shite, but it’s nothing a decent miracle can’t fix, so the spray batters him with heat and fills the bath with kindly steam that’s still billowing around him as he’s towelling off (where did Aziraphale find these towels practically as big as bedsheets?). Out in the front room, he can hear the sounds of more packing-boxes being broken open; Aziraphale’s like a kid with a whole store full of new toys.

He’s shrugging into an old tartan robe that’s actually Aziraphale’s, because he forgot to bring one of his own, when the angel slips in and embraces him from behind.

“Now that you’re warmed up, I have something special for you. For our first night.”

He feels a flutter.

“It might not be what you expect. Don’t turn around.”

He can feel that the angel has stripped to his shirtsleeves, which are rolled up, as his hands move up to cover the demon’s eyes. Stroke the lids down. _Close your eyes._ He’s learned by now that this is his cue to surrender, to do whatever his angel wants, just as he can say _apple _and whatever’s happening will stop. He’s never said it, hopes he never wants_ to._

It’s one of the silk scarves he was tied with back at the lodgings, looping around his eyes, snugged at the nape of his neck.Two others, wadded, stuffed under the blindfold. He can’t see a thing. He’s folded in warm darkness, wearing his angel’s robe. After the cold bite of the wind outside, it’s like an extra cocoon.

Aziraphale leads him back out to the parlour, where he can tell there’s a fire going in the grate. “Turn around here, back up a bit.” There’s a padded edge just behind him, where there hadn’t been anything when he went to warm up. “I’ll take my robe, dear, don’t worry, you’ll be warm. Up you go.” The angel maneuvers him onto a soft surface and swaddles him in fleecy coverings. He’s already relaxed from the shower and the crackle from the fireplace is hypnotic. He wonders what he’s expected to do in this state. If he’s being positioned for something especially imaginative, there’s no clue what it is.

There’s a little sound of fussing with small objects, and then the angel’s hands, warm and oiled, planting themselves uncompromisingly at the base of his long neck and gliding with steady pressure down his shoulders. They do this three or four times, trading off sides, and then cup his neck and pull upward, fingers digging deep trails.

The oil’s light and it smells a little like cloves. He has never considered that muscles at the angle of his jaw could be this tender. The angel’s delicate with them. He hasn’t had an experience like this since Rome, and the masseurs there were rougher. The darkness inside the blindfold leaves him disoriented.

“You didn’t learn this at the Hundred Guineas.” Aziraphale had eventually confessed to that bit of his history; Crowley found he didn’t mind. He didn’t need to be the first, just so long as he was the last.

“Well, actually, I watched a few videos on that absurdly big screen of yours, when you were out, and you know I go to that masseur in Rupert Street every month or so. Last time, I paid Samir to show me how he does some things. He seemed to think it was very sweet.”

This is wonderfully sensual, though there’s nothing about it that leads to bed, and it’s unexpected how much a _hand_ can crave pressure, how taut the strings in his arms and shoulders still are after that long tramp and the needling heat. His legs, never quite sure what they were doing upright anyway, are full of unexpected knots that the angel works at, and like some other things he’s done, it feels wonderful even when it hurts. It’s sixty centuries of armour and vigilance starting to fall away, and it’s a little frightening to let it but he’s learning how that works. It’s always frightening at first, letting things in, giving yourself up.

Aziraphale has the weight to bear down and the sturdy forearms to wring the last resistance out of him. When he eases him over (Crowley’s trying to manage that on his own, but he’s getting pretty hazy) to iron out the long serpentine spine, it’s never been clear how many vertebrae he’s actually got, the phrase _on your belly shall you crawl_ comes back to him, but right now that’s a good place to be. Knuckles rake up either side of that long causeway of bones, strong fingers lift the ropy muscles from his shoulders. He’s floating a fair distance outside his body, at the same time more completely _in_ it than he’s been since it was issued. One hand drops semi-consciously off the edge of the padded table. He feels the blindfold being eased off, the safe darkness replaced by an equally kind reddish glow.

There’s a little gap in memory, and he’s on the couch – a nice squashy one, and he’s glad now Aziraphale insisted on it – wrapped in the fleece sheet and a tartan blanket that’s also covering the angel, watching the mesmerizing sparks and glimmers of the fire. The room’s just right for him, desert temperature. He’s never imagined feeling so loved, not even when God (who still thinks they're both adorable ) looked on his first star and said _Well done, my child. _

The little bit of wine they’ve had, set aside just for this first night, has gone right to his usually impervious head, and he keeps fading in and out. He’s probably going to fuck the angel into the brand new mattress before tomorrow’s over, or maybe the other way around, it's all fine, but right now he’s barely interested in moving a finger. He’s snuggled up against Aziraphale with his head on the angel’s shoulder, and those gentle fingers are ruffling through his hair, and he’s _home._

“Din’ mean to go to sleep on you,” he snuffles.

“That’s exactly what I want you to do. I’ve got you.”

“Long as you want me.”

The angel strokes fingertips down over his dropping lids.

“Close your eyes.”

_finis_

**Author's Note:**

> Tip o’ the nib to Obstinatrix and Wishwellingtons for the masseur in Rupert Street, a throwaway line in the bravura opus _Lead Me To The Banqueting Hall._ One of those fics you read and re-read. With thirty years as a bodyworker under my belt, ever since I read that paragraph I’ve been wanting to give Crowley a decent wring-out in a fic. I can always spot the ones who’re so wired they’ll pass out on the table.
> 
> Come say hello on Tumblr @CopperPlateBeech


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